A good biography is never just about the man or woman who is its subject. It will always be about the world through which the subject moved. In I Have Seen the Future: A Life of Lincoln Steffens, Peter Hartshorn guides us with consummate skill not only through the events of Lincoln Steffens's eventful life, but also provides ample and fascinating context for that life. As near as I can tell, the history of progressive movements and people in the USA has been, the valiant attempts of a few historians and writers notwithstanding, all but cropped out of the story in favor of excessive attention to the founding fathers and "the greatest generation." Hartshorn's book is a useful corrective, reminding us how important people like Steffens and those among whom he moved—John Reed, Emma Goldman, Louise Bryant, Clarence Darrow, Max Eastman . . . the list could go on—were in the early years of the last century. History is, they say, written by the winners, and most of the crusades with which these people involved themselves were, if not absolute failures, then far from entirely successful. Perhaps that's why they've been forgotten. Perhaps that's why movements like "Occupy" are still necessary.